Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!bloom-beacon!ai-lab!karl
From: karl@wheaties.ai.mit.edu (Karl Berry)
Newsgroups: gnu.ghostscript.bug
Subject: Re: outline description of ps fonts wanted
Summary: No outline format is free.
	 .
Message-ID: <3011@weetabix.ai.mit.edu>
Date: 13 Jun 89 19:55:33 GMT
References: <8906110035.AA19352@leonardo.uucp>
Distribution: gnu
Organization: MIT AI Lab, Cambridge, MA
Lines: 23



GhostScript does not yet have a font library.  Support for BDF format fonts 
might be in the next release; at any rate, that will come before anything 
else.  The screen resolution fonts that Adobe has made public domain will 
probably be made available in BDF format at some point.  (Actually, that could 
be done now.)  An outline format for GhostScript is farther down the road.

Adobe's outline format is a jealously guarded secret.  The fonts are encrypted 
in the printers precisely to prevent people from easily doing things with 
the fonts.  (Although I have heard rumours that Bitstream reverse engineered 
the encryption.)

I don't think Adobe (or Bitstream, for that matter) ever sells
unencrypted fonts, or gives ``just plain customers'' the outline format.
Sun's new F3 outline format (developed by Folio) will be given out under
license, supposedly.  But it still won't be public domain.

Ironically, Apple's outline format is at least allegedly free, although we 
haven't been able to track it down in the manuals yet.  (Anyone with information 
on the topic, please write to me.)

karl@wheaties.ai.mit.edu